C3a is clear. There's no Noctis, no Venture, no Legion. A successful ambush on the salvager brought back the mining frigate, partly to sweep up and partly to lure me to attack again. Which I did, against the strategic cruiser, which we already knew about, hoped would attack, and countered with two strategic cruisers of our own. The other corporation probably has other ships, but we doubt they'll throw any more in front of our guns.

There's no harm trying to provoke more activity, though, so glorious leader Fin swaps to a salvaging destroyer and clears up the wreck of the Legion, as well as the few Sleeper wrecks scattered around that our targets were trying to profit from. Nothing happens, of course, except we grab a few million extra ISK in salvage for our efforts. That, and I scan more thoroughly, as the other ships obviously weren't local, which probably makes this a shared neighbouring class 3 w-space system.

I already know about a gravimetric site, where the Noctis was ambushed, and the ladar site that saw the Venture and Legion explode, as well as the system's static exit to low-sec. There are more ladar sites on the edge of the system too, near our K162, but what I would like to find is the wormhole our targets fled through. Judging by the ships' relative positions, considering the system is 105 AU across, I start poking around the inner system with my probes, expecting to find the wormhole nearby. I don't, though. It's just rocks and gas.

I throw my probes across the system, needing to hurry up a little, as the time taken hunting the ships means my probes have twenty minutes of life left in them, and find even more rocks and gas. I suppose that at least gave our victims lots of minor Sleepers to engage, considering there are no anomalies in the system. And, finally, I resolve a second wormhole, and the only other K162 present. The wormhole comes from class 2 w-space, and I'm dying to see what the other corporation is up to now. That's just an expression, by the way.

I don't jump straight through the wormhole, remembering the flotsam I've recovered this evening. First I head home to dump the loot in our hangar, as I don't want to take my booty through a wormhole, not with booty in my hold. Returning to C3a and jumping to C2a sees two ships and two towers on my directional scanner, and I have to wonder if both the Bestower hauler and Heretic heavy interdictor are piloted. Finding out is easy enough. The system is tiny, there are only seven planets and seven moons, three of the planets have no moons, and there are no more than two moons per planet. Locating the towers takes seconds.

I warp directly to the tower holding the Bestower first, wondering if I could possibly get a soft kill to end the evening with. Maybe, as the hauler is piloted, and after a while he even warps out of the tower. Is he heading to a customs office, with hostile pilots in the w-space constellation who have shown no mercy so far? Probably not, but I'll be optimistic and check anyway. Nope, not here, which means the hauler warped to the second tower, now even more easily found, where I see the Heretic sits unpiloted.

The Bestower gets swapped for a Magnate, and the frigate warps out of the tower, to empty space. The ship didn't go towards the wormhole connecting to C3a, which would be crazy, so I assume it went to the system's second static wormhole. It's time to launch probes and scan. Concentrating on where the Magnate disappeared to, I resolve a wormhole pretty quickly. Warping there reveals a static exit to high-sec, but one that has been stabilised to half mass, and is at the end of its life. That's not terribly interesting.

What's more interesting is that the wormhole was very EOL, dying not a couple of minutes later. I see it die, having loitered with intent, leaving me floating in empty space. Or so I assume. I wonder if the Magnate came out here to watch the wormhole collapse, and if he'll now decloak to launch probes, carelessly close to the wormhole. He doesn't, and I'm not waiting any longer to see if he's being cautious. For all I know, he exited to high-sec to buy some new ships. He'll be wanting a new way home at some point.

I'm not sure why, but I scan and resolve the new exit to high-sec. I don't visit the wormhole, not caring to open it or see where it leads, instead simply recalling my probes and heading home. It has been a full evening already, with hunting and ambushes aplenty, and time is drawing on. Two gravimetric sites in the home system with Fin and Aii on-line also equals a mining operation just waiting to happen. All that's needed is our static wormhole to be collapsed—achieved with suitably massive ships—and we're all happy.